One snowball to rule them all...

Hobart is FUCKING COLD.

See:


Thankfully we've now finished up the work we've been doing, so tonight we're off to our boss's wedding, then home on Monday night. We then get barely enough time to unpack and do our washing as we head up to Sydney on Thursday, but more on that later.

Little Victories

The comments section of The Australian online edition is usually a lonely place for a left-leaning atheist to hang out. The paper is the home of some of the most extreme right wing commentators in the nation (cough cough, Albrechtsen), and recently the paper as a whole has been even more pro-God and pro-WorkChoices than usual.

So it was with great pleasure that I scanned the comments to this article earlier today as I strove valiantly to avoid doing any real work. The piece is a soft-news run down of the religious trends captured by the most recent census. It shows that the proportion of atheists is growing in Australia.

The author is careful not to say explicitly whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. But he does ascribe the increase to the fact that kids these days have it too easy. He suggests that because we’ve never lived through a depression or a war, we don’t think about abstract concepts like life and death. The implications are twofold:

- Back in the author’s day, young people were less shallow
- If you think about death, spirituality and religion long and hard enough, you will necessarily reach the conclusion that God (or a God alternative) exists. Atheism is caused by a lack of thought.

He concludes with the line:

‘Perhaps believing baby boomer parents should remove the plasma television from the family home; this would simulate hell-on-earth for stay-at-home [generation] Ys that might just prompt them to think about life’s bigger issues.’

Okay, good on you. Nothing really shocking about this tripe appearing in The Australian. What surprised me, though, were the comments. Usually these stories bring out people from all ends of the political spectrum to add their (poorly spelled) two cents. But in the comments for this article, the atheists [and here you have to imagine I am a large African-American woman] represented!

At the time of writing, the first page of comments was full of people saying that the growth in atheism was a good - or at least indifferent - thing. Usually you would expect there to be two ‘Jesus said atheyists wil burn in the fires of hell’ posts for every ‘God is suxor ps he doesnt exzist’. But not this time. This time, the atheists laid the smack down.

Our side gets so few victories these days, I think it’s important to savour them.

Rock Off Draft Rules

Preliminary matters
1. The inaugural Guitar Hero contest (hereinafter “the Rock Off”) shall take place on Saturday 28 July 2007 at a time and venue to be determined, being mutually convenient for all parties concerned. The contestants will be Chris Lowe and Andrew Roff (hereinafter “the Contestants”).

2. The contest shall be adjudicated by David Nelson (hereinafter “the Judge”). Any disputes arising in the course of the Rock Off that cannot be resolved by reference to the rules shall be determined by the Judge. The Judge’s interpretation of the rules is final.

Song Selection
3. By 6:00 pm Sunday 15 July 2007 the Contestants shall each publish two songs that they wish to be included in the Rock Off, along with the difficulty level the songs are to be played at. Contestants may choose any two songs contained in the game, including bonus tracks, on any difficulty level, but the two songs must be different, and neither song shall be Free Bird.

3(1). Publication for the purposes of the Rock Off shall constitute posting of the songs on The Salmon Conversations website (URL: http://www.salmonchat.blogspot.com). Publication will also be deemed to have taken place if a Contestant conveys the required information to Andrew Roff via email or short message service text message by 4:00 pm Sunday 15 July.

3(2). If a Contestant does not make publication of his song selections by the relevant date and time, the Contestant shall forfeit his right to choose songs for the Rock Off. That Contestant’s songs will be selected by the Judge, without consideration of any advantage that might be given to either Contestant from a particular song selection. If the Judge is required to make selections under this section, he must do so by 6:00pm Wednesday 18 July.

3(3): If Contestants choose the same song at the same difficulty level, there shall in the first instance be an opportunity for either Contestant to amend their selection within one (1) day. If, after this period has elapsed, publication of an amended song has not taken place, that song will be included once in the order of proceedings as Contestant one’s song (see section 4 below). Contestant two’s song shall be selected by the Judge in the manner described in section 3(2). Other song selections shall not be affected. This section does not apply in instances where Contestants choose the same song at different difficulty levels.

Order of Play
4. The order of proceedings for the Rock Off shall be as follows:
- Contestant one, song one
- Contestant two, song one
- 10 Minute Break
- Contestant one, song two
- Contestant two, song two
- 10 Minute Break
- Free Bird, Difficulty Level Medium

4(1). Determination of which Contestant is Contestant one and which Contestant is Contestant two shall be by ‘best of one’ game of rock, paper, scissors. The Judge shall decide the victor of this game in the event of a dispute. The victor shall be Contestant one for the purposes of the Rock Off.

4(2). Both Contestants shall play each song. The Contestant who chose the song will play the song first, followed by the other Contestant. For example, Contestant one, song one shall be played first by Contestant one, then by Contestant two

4(3). Free Bird shall be played first by Contestant one.

Scoring
5. Once each player has completed each song, the score the player achieved for that song shall be recorded by the Judge. ‘Score’ in this context refers to the number of points gained by the contestant, and not by the star rating achieved.

5(1). If a Contestant skips past the screen displaying their score before the score can be recorded by the Judge, the contestant will receive zero (0) points for that song.

5(2). If a Contestant fails a song (that is, if the song is halted before the end due to the large number of notes missed by the Contestant) the Contestant will receive zero (0) points for that song.

5(3). The winner of the Rock Off shall be determined by adding the scores of each player for the five rounds of the contest. The player with the highest aggregate score shall be the winner. The Judge will perform the necessary calculations. The Judge’s decision is final.

Miscellaneous
6. Spectators are permitted to observe the contest. Spectators must remain silent during performance of songs, or the Judge shall be entitled to insist that offending spectators leave the venue.

7. Following the Rock Off there shall be a party. The loser of the contest (that is, the contestant not declared the winner by the judge) shall provide a bottle of Jagermeister and a commensurate quantity of Red Bull for the enjoyment of guests.

The interesting people you meet at the Chinatown Food Court

So at lunch time today I had a craving for inferior laksa (the good stuff being unavailable at the moment due to “the family problem”), so I went to the inferior food court at Chinatown. It was pretty busy, and there were no unoccupied tables. So I did a scan to see which seat in the food court would allow me to sit furthest away from any other patron. That sounds bad, but think about it for a while and you’ll realise that you do the same in this situation.

The best I could do was a seat two seats down from a reasonably normal looking woman. As I approached, balancing my laksa in the beautiful perilous dance of man and foodstuff, the woman glanced up from her beverage and asked me if I needed a hand.

This is where I should have flung my food tray at her and fled the scene. But at the time, I thought she was just being considerate. So I smiled, said something along the lines of ‘thanks but no thanks’ and took my destined seat two seats down from her.

She seemed to ignore me as I picked up my spoon and plunged it beneath the surface of the spicy yellow liquid. Then, at the very moment before arrival in flavour country, she turned to me and said ‘sorry, it’s just that when you live with a family member who’s suffered from burns, you tend to be a bit jumpy around soup.’

Okay, fair enough. Fine. ‘Yeah’ I reply, in a friendly but non-committal way, my spoon poised halfway between the bowl and my mouth.

‘Oh!’ she says. ‘You’ve got a family member who’s been burned too, do you?’

‘No. But I agree, soups can be mighty perilous.’

‘My daughter got burned from some hot water. On her upper thigh [crazy woman’s emphasis, not mine]. We tried running some cold water on it, but boiling water seeps in under the skin. It wouldn’t heal. They had to take a skin graft from some skin on her back, and…’

I won’t recount the entire speech here. She went on for quite a while, and I threw in a ‘yep’ every now and then. By the end I tried to use the tone of my yeps to indicate I’d prefer the conversation to end. I still hadn’t tasted sweet laksa. It seems to me a little insensitive to eat something aromatic and delicious while a woman tells you about her burnt daughter.

Anyway, by this point I hadn’t decided that the woman was crazy, but perhaps just lonely and sad. Still, her daughter’s condition rapidly worsened as she went on, and in addition to her skin graft she was now mentally disabled and ‘dying’ (no elaboration on this last was forthcoming).

Finally she ran out of steam. I took my chance to start tucking in to my laksa. But my enjoyment was to be short lived. ‘What do you do?’ she asked.

I replied that I was a student doing work experience at a law firm. ‘Oh’ she said. ‘Oh. Lawyers. There’s a lot of 666ers and Freemasons in that line of work.’

In one sense, I was relieved, because now I could neatly plonk this woman into the crazy person category. Having worked out where she fit in the grand scheme of things, I could eat my soup and chat without worry.

‘I must say I haven’t heard of any lawyers into that sort of stuff’ said I. [as an aside, does anyone know what a ‘666er’ is? Being a lawyer, I might be one and not even know it].

‘Oh yeah, they’re everywhere, especially in the Family Court.’

‘Really? I don’t have much to do with the Family Court, so I guess you could be right.’

‘Heaps of them, there are. They’re going to get a big shock when they’re in front of the Lord Jesus!’ She laughed at this, so, being the polite young man that I am, I did too.

She continued her rant: ‘I had a lawyer friend once. He said he didn’t believe in God. I said that it’s easy not to believe in something when you can’t see it, but it’ll be very hard not to believe when you’re standing in front of Him! After he heard this my friend repented and quit his job as a lawyer.’

My laksa was growing cold, and although this lady was interesting, I didn’t want her to start quoting Bible passages at me. I also realised that this was a golden opportunity that might not come again. I turned to her and said ‘hold out your hand.’

She did, but asked ‘why?’

I replied ‘I want to draw a pentagram on it.’

She was out of that food court in a flash. And so it was that I contributed to the widely held view that lawyers are the servants of the devil.

Hey kids!

Greetings from occasionally-sunny-but-still-bloody-cold-all-the-time Hobart!

Yes, Imogen and I have returned southwards to the state shaped like a woman's pubic hair (don't blame me, it's on t-shirts here; they have a strange sense of state pride) to work for three weeks.

If you hadn't guessed, Hobart in winter is bloody cold. We arrived on Tuesday morning (we came via the ferry so we could bring the car over) and go to enjoy the leisurely drive from Devenport in the north allllll the way down to Hobart in the south. Three hours of watching a frost-encrusted landscape caused us to a) reminisce about Europe (it really can feel like you're there) and b) crank the car heater. Things haven't been quite so cold as that morning since, but I wouldn't be surprised if the car turned into a block of ice one morning. *shudder*

That said, apparently there's been a bit of snow up on Mt Wellington, so we may head up one morning to muck about.

Congrats must go to Messr. Roff for not only his law internship, but the discovery of his unhitherto-known super-skill of photocopying. Andy, be assured, if I ever get to write a thesis, I know who I'll be getting to make copies for me!

Today we visited the Cascade Brewery for it's 'Family Open Day', where beer, juice and a bouncy castle were all highlighted events. Today we only got some juice (we only were there for a short while, and I had to drive) but when we return on Thursday we'll no doubt snag some beer. Thursday also promises a Cadbury factory tour, so I now dub Thursday 'Beer-and-Chocolate-day' - I'm sure you can all join in on the mainland.

Glad to see that you all had much fun down at Victor (and it's so cute watching the boys trying to chop wood!), and was that Guitar Hero you were playing? If so, damn. Im and I both hope that we'll all be visiting there again come either September, December or anytime next year.

What else is up? Not much. My compy in Melbourne died (bastard!), so most of my pay from these three weeks will be going towards a new system (and yes George, I will be getting the Intel 6600, so don't worry). One little bonus to come out of my compy dying, however, is that Im's mum gave us a Mac Mini to keep - pretty nifty! It's going to become my little music-making-machine. :o)

Anyway, time is limited, and we have to get back to watching Spooks - it's really, bloody, fantastically good. I'd advise you lot to have a look sometime. *nods* We've also been watching the live-action version of The Tick and Press Gang. Don't judge us; we know where you live.

Hope you're all well and keeping warm.

Love Jules (and Im)

At Victor

As usual, clicky on pictures for larger servings.

Accolades

I have had bestowed on me the highest compliment a legal clerk can obtain. This morning, after a lightning fast trip to the Supreme Court library, I was dubbed a ‘good photocopier’!

Photocopying is a vital skill for any aspiring lawyer. Even if you’re crap at legal research, even if you can’t argue your way out of a paper bag, if you’re a good photocopier you’ll be okay. People will like you because they can get you to do photocopying. And, let’s face it, no one likes to do photocopying.

The downside to being a good photocopier is that word of my prowess will soon spread. In my four weeks here I’ve only had to photocopy one article and one case, but now that everyone knows I am available and competent re photocopying duties, I may be in hot demand.

Who said a career in the law wasn’t glamourous?

Competence, baby

Have you ever met someone that was so competent they were sexy? This sounds kind of ridiculous at first, but I reckon that if you give it some thought, the answer might be yes.

At lunch time today I went to pick up some contact lenses from my optometrist. The receptionist there is a perfect example of this phenomenon. Now, I’ll admit, it doesn’t hurt that she’s actually also quite physically attractive. But really, there are plenty of good looking people out there with whom I can keep my lust at a controllable level. When I talk to this receptionist, I just want to vault over the counter and get busy amongst the Medicare forms.

Today, I walked in and she said ‘Hi Andrew! You’re here to pick up your contact lenses, right?’. I should explain that it’s been three months since I was last in the store, and six months since I’d seen this girl. She wouldn’t have known me from a bar of soap, but she knew who had orders waiting for collection, and she’d obviously read enough of my details to know I was a 23 year old male. She had done enough preparation and was intelligent enough to put two and two together. She picked up my contacts from where they were waiting in a neat pile with a bunch of others, and chatted with me as she processed my payment.

This description doesn’t fully capture the aura of professionalism this girl was displaying. It’s just something you can tell about a person when they have complete confidence in their ability to do their job well; and when they know that you know it too. Add to that a cheerful but efficient manner, and that, people, is someone who’s so competent they’re sexy.

Now if you agree with me that competence can indeed be sexy, this raises some interesting implications. You might be tempted to think that as a result, intelligent people should have an inherent advantage in appealing to the opposite sex. Well, clearly that ain’t always necessarily so. For a start, if they’re operating outside their field of expertise, they’ve got no advantage whatsoever. It also generally only has an effect when you’re providing a service for someone else. That basically limits it to a work context. A possible exception is, say, if you cooked a really awesome meal at your house for a dinner guest, but in the main, it’s a job thing.

Even at work, even when providing a service face to face, directly to another human being, the ‘sexiness of competence’ may not be working for you. As an obvious example, consider the much-maligned hypothetical IT Professional. He (for it is almost always a he [sorry Kate]) is certainly intelligent. For the sake of the argument, let’s also assume that he is in fact quite good at his job. Does he reap the benefits of the sexiness of competence? Almost certainly not. Here are some possible reasons why:

• He is surly and arrogant. Remember, the sexiness of competence relies on a cheerful but efficient manner.
  
• While he’s good at his job, the person he’s helping is in no position to appreciate this. A lay person has trouble differentiating good IT service from bad IT service, largely because the person he’s serving is probably incapable of understanding what it is the IT person is doing. This is exacerbated by the fact that IT guys generally are bad communicators, and can’t be arsed explaining what it is they’re doing.
  
• When I pick up my contact lenses, the resolution is quick, and the outcome is exactly what I’d hoped for. The receptionist has done everything I could have asked of her (desk sex aside). In contrast, provision of IT services is complicated, and it rarely results in an instant, completely satisfactory outcome.

But perhaps the biggest limiting factor to the power of sexy competence is that, for most people, when they’re at their most competent, they’re at work. And at work, many people are not in a position to be making moves on their customers.

Sorry IT guys, it looks like you need that gym membership after all.

Y'all need to be watchin' this

Here



Warning: there's a bit of 'canasta' type language in this clip. So probably NSFAWWYWWSWDLP. That is, not safe for a workplace where you're working with someone who doesn't like profanity.

There's a whole series of these things on youtube.

Bus anecdotes - and a question of etiquette

So I was on the bus the other night, minding my own business, listening to a bit of crazy 80s style synth metal on my mp3 player. Shut up, you probably listen to the Backstreet Boys when you're alone, so don't judge me!

Anyway, the bus was reasonably crowded, but I had one of the few spare seats next to me. As it happened, the row of seats behind me also had only one occupant. That occupant happened to be someone who can only fairly be described as a homeless guy.

The bus stopped, and the doors swung open. On stepped another man who, once again, seemed to be domiciliarily challenged. That is to say, I think he was homeless, and I shall dub him HG2 for the purposes of the anecdote. Now, picture me in my shiny new suit, HG1 behind me. HG2 has swiped his ticket, and is bearing down on us. I like to think of myself as a man of the people, but I must confess I was thinking I'd rather you didn't sit next to me, if that's alright with you

And here's the fascinating thing: HG2 takes one look at me, sizes me up, and walks past my seat to sit with HG1. I'm ashamed to say I feel a bit relieved. I'm also ashamed to say I felt slightly indignant. I'd just been snubbed by a homeless man.


A question of etiquette
Is it okay to talk on your mobile phone when you’re on the bus? When other people do, it makes me feel a bit uncomfortable, like I’m eavesdropping on their conversation. There’s nothing I can really do not to hear it, but I still feel a bit uneasy. What do you guys think? Does it depend on the conversation you’re having? How loud you’re talking? How many other people there are around you?

A bus is a difficult social scene. Actually, I am so over busses it's not funny. When it's freezing and the bus decides not to come? I'm over that. When fat people take up lots of space? I'm over that. Seeing moderately attractive women (for some reason they never seem to be really attractive on my bus route) and never being able to talk to them because you're on a bus and that would be a creepy thing to do? My friends, I am over that.